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nChapter One Hundred and Sixty: Holding One’s Head High

nAfter the Autumn Releases Conference, many of YL’s official forums had fallen silent. But on Xiao Yu’s second day at the office, YL published the details of the mystery designer’s identity, his old job as SI’s chief designer FISH, his position as the top disciple of SI’s previous chief designer, and the astounding contract YL had offered him. At the same time, Yan Jin’s official spokesperson released the results of the car accident, emphasizing three times that there were no injuries and that it was simply an accident. Finally, they mischievously denied any accusations of using this incident to force the mystery designer to join YL.

nUnder the post, many people shared their skeptical thoughts.

n“I’m just pretending I believe this.”

n“You’ve won such an asset but you’re still pretending?”

n“Enjoy your fun while you can.”

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nWhile YL’s new chief designer rushed around busily, designer forums were filled with inside scoops, conjectures, and news. It was the second time since the Autumn Release Conference that the forum exploded with activity because of the mystery designer.

nFISH is Mr. Mystery! Xiao Yu is the mystery designer! YL welcomed him in right after SI fired him!

nThe dramatic storyline that even TV shows couldn’t compare with shocked industry insiders to no end and filled them with pity. As for the outsiders that avidly followed the latest news, they couldn’t care less about SI’s misfortune or YL’s fortune. They treated it as entertainment. The twists and turns of such a storyline would always attract many followers. The topic of “the mystery designer’s professional career” quickly became a topic of mealtime conversations and media coverage. There were even publishers that wanted Xiao Yu to write a book. If it wasn’t for Yan Jin protectively blocking these requests, Xiao Yu didn’t know for how long they would chase him around.

nAs opposed to the actual facts of what had happened, most people preferred the gossip and conspiracy theories. Compared to technical posts or official news, random posts such as these had the highest click rate:

n“Here’s what really happened between FISH and SI.”

n“Was it planned all along or a coincidence? Let’s analyze this fantastic story together.”

n“【 Repost 】(Yan-God short novel) Let’s work together to get our homes back!”

nXiao Yu was a frequent visitor to the forum. He didn’t just have a single account either; some were for posting analysis while others were for vote brigading. A while back, his primary account had received so many scolding private messages that he couldn’t log on to it, so he had created another account on the forum. Now that the messages to his main account had stopped, Xiao Yu happily logged onto his officially verified account as FISH. He returned to a thread that had been drowned out by newer topics that criticized him for his “sinister intentions”. Under each post, he replied with a sneering smiley face.

nOn that day, the atmosphere of the forum was full of “crying.jpg”, “kneel down before God”, and “Mom is asking why I’m kneeling before the forum.”

nThose that enjoyed stirring up controversy even went back to find the old anti-Xiao Yu conspiracy posts from high-profile bloggers to seriously analyze how hard their faces had been slapped.

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nThose bloggers: “……”

nWe’re innocent, okay? You might not believe it, but we were hired as “internet ghostwriters” by Yan Jin!

nAfter Yan Jin had suddenly betrayed them in pursuit of his lover, they were left tragically abandoned with their faces completely swollen.

nIt was important to note that after the car accident, most people had felt that it was simply an accident at first. The only reason that the public opinion had turned against Xiao Yu was because several reputable celebrities had come forward to give their testimony against him.

nThese people were the successful elites in every industry, but because their leader had suddenly changed his mind, they were now labeled as the shameful “villains”.

nWhile their situation was already quite miserable, it was even worse for the bandwagoners who had understood neither the laws nor the entire story. Xiao Yu gave each of their posts a smiley face which was shortly followed by a deluge of people tagging the author of the post to mock them. It was a very atypical day in the forum. All of the bandwagoners’ secondary accounts that had been used to sway public opinion were tagged an extreme number of times. It was a rare sight.

nThe YL employees that had originally condemned Xiao Yu were forced to come crawling back to him for mercy. When they weren’t repenting for their sins, they were exaggeratedly praising Xiao Yu.

nNo one in Heaven nor Earth can surpass you! You are unparallelled in both past and future!

nThey really were quite shameless.

nBut the worst was reserved for those SI employees that had continued to kick Xiao Yu after he had already been beaten down. On the day that Xiao Yu had been fired from SI, the forum was filled with new information threads entirely from SI employees. The netizens that enjoyed causing drama revived many of these long dead threads to the front page.

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n“Hahahaha, do your faces hurt?”

n“You guys thought you were kicking FISH out. Little did you guys know, he was the one leaving you guys!”

n“We’ve returned to where it all happened. How does it feel now, knowing that you guys gave up the mystery designer?”

n“Everyone who’s mocking SI, get lost! I’ll go first…”

n“It’s the drama of the year.”

nThere were quite a few designers in SI that were unhappy with Xiao Yu. Especially after Xiao Yu suffered defeat after defeat to the mystery designer, there were many that pinned the blame on Xiao Yu’s lack of skill. After Xiao Yu had been fired, many of them had ridiculed Xiao Yu on the forums with posts such as “Xiao Yu’s strength is insufficient so he rode on others’ coattails to become the chief designer”, “Xiao Yu is completely overconfident with a non-standard background”, and “Xiao Yu doesn’t care about the company; he spends all day developing his personal career”.

nThese posts now seemed incomparably funny.

nXiao Yu’s strength is insufficient? He rode on others’ coattails to become the chief designer? The mystery designer stepped on SI’s director, punched SI’s chairman, fought a thousand bloody battles at the Autumn Conference, and surpassed City B and City H’s two largest design companies. Nobody could stop him.

nCompletely overconfident with a non-standard background? He’s the star disciple of the previous SI’s chief designer. With three years of overseas study and five years of work experience, he’s ascended to the heavens with his brilliance at age twenty-six. It’s his natural right to be proud of his success.

nHe doesn’t care about the company and spends all day developing his personal career? Well, this one isn’t wrong at all. He designed drafts for YL for an entire year as SI’s chief designer without anyone finding out. He gave SI no leeway at all.

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nThe lopsided public opinion strengthened Xiao Yu’s resolve. He eagerly awaited the next time he came face-to-face against SI.

nLast year, after the end-of-year designers’ evaluation, the general consensus had been that YL was the number one design company in City S. However, Xiao Yu had merged back into his original body, and YL had sunk into a depression with Yan Jin’s resignation. With SI’s announcement that Lin Zhou would take over as chief designer and the unknown status of where the mystery designer would go, the situation had become very confusing.

nBut that too had come to an end.

nWith the announcement of Xiao Yu’s identity, the title of the number one design company in the city fell back to YL. SI instead was relegated to the level of laughingstocks. Their previous decades of achievement and knowledge couldn’t rescue their reputation from this one disastrous year.

nActually, Xiao Yu didn’t hate SI. Even though it didn’t feel good to get fired, it was the result of a pressured situation. Furthermore, Xiao Yu wasn’t the type to hold grudges. He was already satisfied after all the venting he’d done. He didn’t plan to embark on a path of revenge against SI or anything.

nHowever, that was only for SI. His matters with Lin Zhou were not yet over.

nXiao Yu still hadn’t attained his recompense for Lin Zhou drugging him, for telling him that he’d messed around with his car’s brakes, or for plagiarizing his designs.

nUntil recently, Xiao Yu still hadn’t given up on contacting Lin Zhou in every possible way despite Lin Zhou blacklisting him. Lin Zhou hadn’t responded to any of his calls, texts, or social media messages.

nAlthough Yan Jin had clearly expressed that Xiao Yu could rely on him for help, for this matter, Xiao Yu never thought once about asking Yan Jin. This was his own grudge; the fewer there were involved, the better. Therefore, however he tried to contact Lin Zhou or request Jing Mo to investigate, he always did it stealthily (self-assumed) to not disturb Yan Jin (also self-assumed). Without Yan Jin’s help, Xiao Yu quickly discovered that there was no way he’d be able to meet Lin Zhou given all of Lin Zhou’s vigilance to avoid him.

nAnd under such circumstances, the only solution Xiao Yu could come up with was to make use of the company to look for a business opportunity that would allow him to directly interact with Lin Zhou.

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nThankfully, Xiao Yu did not have to wait too long for this opportunity.

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nThis was probably the first time Xiao Yu found his desk location in the chairman’s office useful.

nHe carefully retrieved the official seal, and with shaking hands, he took out an inconspicuous-looking contract.

nHe felt like he was committing a crime.

nYan Jin had left five minutes earlier to lead the weekly meeting. Xiao Yu had excused himself under the pretext that he didn’t feel well.

nOf course, that wasn’t true. His real aim was to use Yan Jin’s official seal to sign this order while no one was around.

nEver since he’d joined YL, the orders had come in unendingly. Yan Jin’s desk always had a pile of contracts that he’d never be able to clear. Seeing that their previous work had gotten out of hand, Yan Jin now followed a very conservative policy: he’d avoid direct conflicts the other major design companies, including SI. Since they were able to sign excellent quality work orders without needing to compete, was there any need to cause trouble?

nXiao Yu understood this policy very clearly. However, he really did not want to give up another opportunity to make contact with SI.

nIt was a collaboration contract. If YL signed it, they would get together with one or a couple other jewelry design companies to put together a global exhibit.

nTo the best of Xiao Yu’s understanding of SI, SI would find any way to participate in this.

nThe reasoning was quite simple. SI always had ideas of expanding onto the world stage. This global exhibition was the best platform for this in the next two years.

nFor a company that had just recently started in City S, YL didn’t need to expand their global influence. However, it wasn’t the same for SI. SI’s appetite could no longer be satisfied by domestic orders alone. With their repeated losses in City S, if this trend continued, SI would be forced to lay off employees to maintain their regular operations. SI definitely wouldn’t want to miss this opportunity.

nYan Jin’s habit for auditing the orders for signing was to divide the contracts into three stacks: one for those he planned to directly sign, one for those he planned to directly reject, and the last for those that he had to spend more time to consider.

nXiao Yu had tracked the progress of this order. In the beginning, Yan Jin had put it in the last pile for reconsideration. Before he’d gone to to the weekly meeting, Yan Jin had gone through the pile and finally had placed it in the “reject” pile.

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